Olly Spellmaker and the Sulky Smudge
by Freddyg103
Summary: Olly Spellmaker, the motor-biking witch, has a new assignment. To kit out an un-haunted hotel with ghosts galore! But while Olly knows how to capture spooks, she's not so good at finding them in the first place.
1. A Job Offer

_**1- A Job Offer**_

From: .

Subject: Need your help ...

O Alex, little mate, little friend.

Be a precious angel and meet me for a nosh and a natter.

It's always good to get an email from a friend, but Alex wasn't sure about this one. He did like Olly, but . . . Well, she was a bit embarrassing. She was a witch, for one thing, and she kept trying to persuade Alex that he was a witch too, when he didn't want to be a witch. Even if he _could _twingle.

From: .uk

Subject: Wot's this about?

It had better be good.

From: .

Subject: Money, money, money . . .

It is about things that go crash, bang, wallop in the night. C'mon. Be a friend. Meet me in town, by the fountain, four-fifteen. I'll give you a lift home.

This sounded to Alex like more witchy stuff. He really didn't want to get involved - but they did owe Olly a favor. When their house had been invaded by a Hairy Bogle that decorated at the dead of the night, it had been Olly who saved them from it.

From: .uk

Subject: Ok.

This had better be good . . .

The fountain stood at the end of the marketplace, by Boots and Woolworths. It was a big white thing, fancy as a wedding cake, carved with rearing horses that had fishes' tails, and women dressed like ancient Greeks with jugs on their heads, and dolphins, bunches of grapes, garlands of flowers - it was just dripping with carving. Not with water any more, though. It had been dry for years, though the two big basins for the water to fall into were still there and the water spouts in the shape of chubby babies' heads. But it had made a wonderful meeting place. People splitting up to go to different shops would say 'Meet you by the fountain in ten minutes.' There were always people sitting on its steps and on the edges of its basins, waiting for other people.

Alex quickly spotted Olly, leaning against one of the fountains basins. Her short, fat figure stood out, especially against the white stone, because she was wearing her black motorcycle leathers and boots. She didn't seem to have her helmet with her. When she saw him, she spread her arms and called, 'Ally! Blessings be, little pal of mine!'

Alex cringed and looked round to see if anyone was laughing at them, but none of the passing shoppers seemed to have taken any notice. 'Tone it down,' he said. Her hair was still impenetrably black and shiny, he saw, and she was still making up her eyes with thick black lines, like an ancient Egyptian, though she'd left off the blue lipstick today. There was still a silver stud through the middle of her bottom lip and another through her eyebrow. He looked to see if, as usual, she was wearing a moon earring in one ear and a sun earring in the other. To his amazement, he saw that her earrings were dangling silver skeletons. They had tiny joints and waggled their arms and legs as she moved her head. It was hard to stop watching them.

'Come on, quick step,' Olly said. 'We got places to go, people to see.'

Alex followed her as she started off down the street. 'Where are we going and for how long? I've got to get home by six.'

'No worries,' Olly said. 'You worry too much, little pal. The Goddess looks after all!'

She led him downhill, to the small car park by the library. He looked for her big motorbike, a gleaming black-and-silver machine with 'Stormrider' painted on the fuel tank. He was half looking forward to a ride on it and a bit nervous at the same time. What was he going to do for a helmet? Did Olly have one in his size? But he couldn't see a motorbike in the car park.

Olly went up to a little Vauxhall Nova, a very old one, and started unlocking it. Alex gaped. The bonnet was covered in rust spots and one door was light blue, while the rest of the car was maroon. 'Is this _yours_?' he said.

'Your carriage awaits!' Olly left the passengers door open for him and went round to the drivers door.

When they were both inside, he said, 'What happened to Stormrider?'

'_Hors de combat_,'Olly said, as she started the car and reversed out of the parking place. 'A cracked piston. Humungous job, and the garage geezers are demanding oodles of spondulicks before Storm rides again.'

As they drove through town, Alex said sadly, 'I wish you'd talk English.'

'Storm's off the road,' Olly translated. 'She can be fixed, but it's going to cost big bucks. That's why I need your help, little pal. Got a job. It's tricky but I need the readies pronto. So please, please, be a brick, and render assistance, or it's Shank's pony _pour moi _when my friend gets this car back.'

'What is the job?' Alex asked.

'A-ha! Been practicing your witchcraft?'

'I don't want to be a witch, I told you.'

'But you are a witch. You twingle. Don't fight it petal.'

'Just because I get - get -' Alex couldn't think of another word for it, 'get twingles doesn't mean I have to be a witch. I want to work with computers.'

'Nothing says a witch can't work with computers,' Olly said. 'Some of the best do, these days. Still, I won't nag.'

They were still driving through town, along busy roads. As they pulled up at traffic lights, Alex tried again. 'What kind of job is it?'

'We'll be there soon,' Olly said.

'Are you going to tell me what the job is?'

'Not till we're there.'

Annoyed, Alex said, 'Why do you wear motorcycle leathers to drive a stupid beat-up old Nova?'

'I'm just a fool for black leather. It's so witchy, darling.'

The long, straight road lined with big houses turned into a long, straight road passing between fields and hedges. Alex realized that he knew it. He'd often driven along it with his father when they were going to the Edge, a piece of wild, open country where you could wander through woodlands or scramble up red sandstone cliffs. But Olly drove past the turning for the Edge and continued on, driving fast along a dual carriageway. They passed a sign, painted in dark green and gold. It said, 'The Olde Manor Inne.' An arrow pointed to the right. Olly slowed down, and turning right, into an entrance almost hidden with overgrown bushes and trees.

Alex leaned forward, peering through the windscreen. All he could see was thick greenery leaning in from either side. There was no sign of any building at all. The lane curved and a gap in the hedge let them see a green pond with ducks swimming on it and then another curve brought them to the Inne.

It was a very old, timbered house. The timbers, some curved, some straight, were weathered to a soft, silvery grey. Between the timbers, the plasterwork was a pale ochre, while above, the uneven rood was of dark slate, grown with orangey lichens and tufts of green moss. The glass of the small windows seemed black, as if the house were full of darkness, but the diamon-shaped panes flashed brightly where they caught the sun. The door was set back within an arched porch, but Alex could see that, in the shadows of the porch, the door was small and narrow, with a massive beam above it and another at either side. The dark wood of the door was strudded with many rows of big-headed nail.

'Look at that,' Olly said. 'Did you ever see a more haunted house?'


	2. The Olde Manor Inne

_**2 - The Olde Manor Inne**_

They got out of the Nova and stood looking at the old Inne. It was very quiet. A couple of cars were parked in the small car park, but no one was about. The busy road seemed a long way off and the traffic could hardly be heard. Instead there was a soft, insistent sound, like falling rain, which Alex soon realized was the sound of the wind passing through the upper branches of the tress. And it was getting dark. He felt a need to look over his shoulder.

'Built in thirteen-umpty-plonk,' Olly said. 'Leans a bit, but hasn't fallen down yet. Come and have a butcher's inside.'

She led the way into the little porch. As he stepped under the heavy timbers, and on to the uneven, buckled red tiles, Alex felt the age of the place press on him. The beams that framed the door were carved with little odd figures. Women with bare breasts held swords and turned into trees below their waists. Ugly little faces screwed up their eyes and thrust out long tongues or showed fangs. Funny things to have carved on your front door, he thought.

Olly shouldered open the heavy door and Alex followed her into a tiny hallway, floored with warped wooden boards that tilted up and down under his feet. There were even gaps between some of them. Dark wood was everywhere, absorbing the light until everything was dim and shadowy. The walls were all of dark wood and dark beams crossed the ceiling. In front of them rose a narrow staircase of polished, black wood, with a tall stair-post carved into the shape of a seated hound. The steps were worn into hollows and they sloped and slanted. It was as if the age of the place - the sheer weight of all those years, all those centuries, had pushed everything slightly out of true.

A pleased voice said, 'Olly! Hello!' Startled, Alex looked to his right, and saw a tiny reception desk made of dark, polished wood, but obviously much more modern than the rest of the house. Behind it, a young woman smiled.

Olly leaned on the desk in her motorcycle leathers.

'Allow me to introduce my glamorous assistant.' She waved a theatrical hand. 'Give us a twirl, Alex.'

The young woman behind the desk leaned forward to see him. 'Hello Alex,' she called and waved. 'I'm Lisa.'

Alex, who didn't like being called a glamorous assistant, couldn't decide whether to scowl or smile, and didn't have time to make up his mind before Olly said, 'Off you go and have a nozzuk. See what you make of the old place.'

'What?' Alex said. 'Just - wander round? On my own?' It was something, he felt, that was likely to get him into trouble.

'It's cool,' Olly said. 'Everybody knows me here.'

'They don't know _me_,' Alex said.

'Don't be such a worry-bead. If anybody collars you, just say you're with Olly. Now skedaddle, go on, git.'

'What am I supposed to be looking for?' Alex asked.

'Oh - boggles, bloody-bones, demons, night-bats, bargeists, scrags, breaknecks, mum-pokers, melch-dicks, swaiths, gringes, shag-foals, yeth-hounds, nisses - anything of that sort see if you get a twingle.'

A twingle was what Olly called that feeling Alex got when he felt as though there was something behind him. It was more than a nervy feeling that made him want to turn round, though. Olly had taught him to recognize the sense of very quiet noise going on somewhere. A sort of crackling and buzzing that he felt more than heard. It set his teeth on edge slightly and made his hands uncomfortable, as if the palms and thumbs were itching. The twingle.

'On my own? Thanks a lot.'

'Oh, you're not scared of a few old boggleboes and chittifaces,' Olly said. 'Go on with you. Have a good gander and then come back - and Lisa and me'll debrief you.'

Lisa laughed at this, which Alex thought was rude and unkind of her, and he was glad to leave their company. He decided to look upstairs first. 'This had better be worth it,' he said to Olly, as he started to climb.

At the top of the steep, uneven stairs was a long, dark corridor, all heavy beams and black, wooden panelling. The windows were small and let in only faint, grey light. His footsteps rang out sharply on the bare floorboards as he walked towards the far end. To his left was a line of secretive closed doors, with numbers on them. Anything might come out of them, he thought, imagining a chittiface or boggleboe suddenly sticking out its head to demand room service. Then he realized that he wasn't really scared at all. He just thought that he ought to feel scared.

He stood by a window to think about it and looked out at a grey, wintry yard, with little trees in pots and a few damp tables and chairs. He remember when Hairy Bill had ben haunting his own house. All the time he'd been half aware of a sort of buzzing in his head, an itching in his palms. Then his mother had invited Olly in, and Olly had told him that was why a haunted a house was called 'an unquiet house'. But he felt no twingle here. The place was old, it was dark, it was silent. It seemed fit to be a haunted house in every way. But it was a quiet house.

He went back along the corridor and down the stairs. No one was at the reception desk, so he wandered along the corridor towards the back of the house, feeling a little guilty, as if he was doing something he shouldn't. There were odd little twisted doorways opening off into tiny, dark little rooms, furnished with tables and benches. In one, a coal fire was burning in a grate.

He pushed through a door into a much larger room that had been made into a bar. Great supporting timbers rose up from the floor to the ceiling, which was crossed with black beams. There was Olly, sitting at a table with a half pint of bear. 'Chips coming soon!' she said, the silver skeletons dancing in her ears. 'Park your bum and tell me what you've gleaned.'

'You're driving,' Alex said, looking at the half pint.

'Half a pint of Throgmorton's Fancy and a plate of chips won't put me over the limit,' she said. 'What d'you think of the little grey home in the west?'

Alex sat down opposite her on a long settle. 'It's not haunted.'

'No more it is. I knew you had the knack.'

Alex was annoyed. 'What have you dragged me over here for, if it's not haunted?'

At that moment, Lisa came from somewhere in the shadows beside the bar, carrying a tray with two bowls of chips on it. She set it down on th table with a smile.

'The infant phenomenon,' Olly said to her, 'wants to know what we're doing here when the place isn't haunted by so much as a will o' the wisp?'

'Ah,' said Lisa, leaning on the edge of the table. 'Well, you see, Alex - the place isn't haunted. But I'd like it to be.'


End file.
